A tipper truck, sometimes referred to as a dump or dumper truck, is a vehicle that is typically used in the construction industry for transporting aggregate (e.g. gravel or sand). The tipper typically comprises an engine, a driver cab and a trailer. The trailer usually has a trailer chassis or frame with a tipper body, in the form of an open-top cuboidal container, pivotably mounted thereto. A hydraulic cylinder is provided between the frame and the tipper body and can be extended to pivot the tipper body to a tipping position in which the load is emptied from the body. The cylinder can be retracted to lower the tipper body. It should be appreciated that this is merely one form of tipper truck and other types do exist.
It is important that the tipper body is not overloaded as this may make the tipper truck unsafe to drive. It is known to load a tipper body with only a certain number of “scoops” of aggregate in order to prevent the tipper body from being overloaded. However, this is not a particularly accurate method of preventing overloading. It is also known to drive a loaded tipper vehicle onto vehicle weighing scales in order to weigh the load. Whilst this arrangement may be accurate, in many circumstances it may not be convenient or indeed possible to use vehicle weight scales.
It is therefore desirable to provide an improved method and system for determining the mass of a load within a tipper body.